Posted on 01/12/2015 5:54:35 AM PST by SoConPubbie
Former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania threw a few elbows at several potential rivals for the 2016 GOP presidential nomination, calling possible contenders Sens. Rand Paul of Kentucky and Ted Cruz of Texas “bomb throwers” with little experience.
“Do we really want someone with this little experience?” Mr. Santorum said, referring to Mr. Paul, Mr. Cruz and Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, The New York Times reported. “And the only experience they have basically — not Rubio, but Cruz and Paul because I don’t think Rubio is going to go — is bomb throwing? Do we really want somebody who’s a bomb thrower, with no track record of any accomplishments?”
Doug Stafford, a senior adviser to Mr. Paul, told the paper they would pass on responding to the “alleged wisdom” of someone who lost re-election in 2006 by 18 points and who “has spent the time since then trying to convince people to elect him to an even higher office than the one he was booted out of.”
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...
Funny, I remember when Santorum was serving in the Senate, and he was extremely popular with conservatives at the time. (certainly moreso than Newt was when Newt served as Speaker, history revisionism notwithstanding) Must have been doing all that evil liberal stuff behind the scenes, right? Sneaky guy.
Perhaps even more damning is what happened in Alaska Senate for a while, where the GOP had a clear majority but the Dems were able to run the government because a bunch of RINOs voted with the Dems to form a "bipartisan coalition" government, and then the RINO-RAT coalition punished the actual Republicans who refused to join the combine, and made those five principled conservatives into the "minority opposition". Alaska is a safe Republican state and Dems end up in power only because of treasonous Republicans who refuse to support their own party.
Of course, the anti-17thers claim state legislators are sooooo wonderful and somehow magically more principled than federal legislators and dedicated to doing what "the founders" envisioned. I guess George Washington and Thomas Jefferson WANTED Republicans to give the socialist minority control of Alaska politics.
Yeah, if only he followed the lead of most freepers, and supported the disgraced ex-Speaker who had won a whooping two states in the 2012 primary, instead of backing the guy who ACTUALLY had a chance of defeating Romney in that election.
Too bad reason fell on deaf ears at the time.
We’ve since recovered the Alaska State Senate, but sadly the rats and RINOs manged to narrowly elect their libtard gubernatorial ticket of an EX RINO and an Obama Stalinist, thanks to some incredible foolishness from her Majesty.
In TN it was a one seat GOP Maj and the 1 prick traitor essentially switched parties and became the rat Speaker while officially pretending to remain a Republican. In NH, multiple traitors. I’m disgusted.
The NH House is too big and has too much turnover in every election, it should be cut in half at least. In 2006 when the rats won control, tons of surprise winners failed to even show up for duty. It certainly seems to be a dysfunctional body.
Just imagine this garbage playing out in Senate races, hardly any seats would be safe for conservatives.
GNEWT lovers don’t want to hear it but
1)He’s an establishment RINO and chronic flip flopper with an ego the size of Mars, not much better Romney
2)He destroyed his own campaign by attacking Romney from the left on Bain
3)It was he who stayed in race after he couldn’t win and divided the vote, allowing Romney to win easily. That’s right HIM, not Santorum, HIM. He was dead in the water and HE stayed in. His fans need to STHU about Santorum being a “stalking horse” for Romney.
I DO NOT think Rick Santorum should run again but I was proud to cast my vote for him over Romney, Geckoboy, and the trash Ron Paul.
Can someone hold this as a sign over his head for the next 365 days?
If we run someone that can win, we'll end up with someone like McCain, or Romney, or Graham, or Schwarzenegger (yeah I know he wasn't born here, his Liberal ideals), etc etc. If Sarah will run, she'll be able to connect to a loooot of people in this country, including, I bet, the rural areas of Liberal states.
Santorum would’ve at least gotten a higher % of the vote than Willard in the general (and wouldn’t have turned off countless Conservatives and working-class voters by being the embodiment of the arrogant and out of touch “rich Republican” stereotype).
"One of the criticisms I make is to what I refer to as more of a Libertarianish right. They have this idea that people should be left alone, be able to do whatever they want to do, government should keep our taxes down and keep our regulations low, that we shouldn’t get involved in the bedroom, we shouldn’t get involved in cultural issues. That is not how traditional conservatives view the world....There is no such societey, that I am aware of, where we've had radical individualism and that it succeeds as a culture.” -- Rick Santorum
Santorum voted for raising the minimum wage six times. He was all for getting rid of Planned Parenthood -- good!!! Atta boy Rick! I hate abortion as much as you do, amen brother! -- but instead of ceasing its funding so free people as taxpayers kept more of their money, he wanted to continue government involvement by using at least some of those taxes to pay for pro-adoption programs. As if Americans couldn't handle it without government "help."
Moral Americans can do and have done incredibly great things. They would continue to do incredibly great things except their government is an amoral force that tyrannically overpowers them "for our own good." Rick doesn't trust Americans to do the right thing morally any more than the Democrats do -- he wants to use government force to assure they make the "right" moral choice. That's government tyranny.
Santorum supported government force backing of labor unions that favor them in no-longer "free" markets. Santorum worked happily and well on the model of applying government liberally -- free-handedly, and although it was in pursuit of Christian ends, it was still the liberal use of government.
Bottom line, fellow FReepers, is that during the 2012 campaign, I read every single word of the websites of both Newt and Santorum. EVERY SINGLE WORD.
I bet not a one of you Santorum supporters did. Newt laid out a plan -- a flawed plan, a bumpy plan, but a RIGHT plan -- to cut back government significantly on almost every level. It was detailed and it was mostly of substance with a minimum of feel-good phraseology.
Santorum had mostly a lot of happy talk about how strong "family values" build "strong economies" (?? Then why does Mexico, where family values rule supreme, have one of the weakest economies?????) though with some solid positions on taxation somewhat akin to Gingrich's except for favoring unions more. There was zero anywhere in Santorum's campaign or presentation that marked him as a conservative -- that is, advocating for the conservative use of government. Meanwhile, most of Gingrich's website detailed a plan -- flawed perhaps but a plan nonetheless -- that specifically addressed and declared a strong foundation in limited government conservatism.
People accuse me of being a "purist" because I, a life-long middle-aged Republican, refused in 2012 to vote for a Republican with a standing record of advancing the force of government on five major fronts: health care, homosexual "rights," environmentalism, abortion, and judicial activism (that would be Romney).
Yet if it had been Gingrich, I'd have voted for that Republican, with all of Gingrich's many flaws. So I was some "purist."
There are limits to what I will vote for, these days. I will only vote for politicians whose vision and goal is to CUT GOVERNMENT. Anyone who has looked at Santorum's standing record understands that his goal is fundamentally to change government into one more friendly to Christian values, but with the same tyrannical force.
The words in his quotes above illustrate it pretty clearly. "Conservative" if you mean "advocates Christian values," "liberal" if you mean "liberal use of government."
You do raise valid points with respect to Santorum, and it makes him look far more left-leaning and statist than he appeared to be.
However, saying that, we must realize that the group of candidates than ran in 2012 were second-rate (or worse). They weren’t the cutting edge of the Conservative movement, they were RINOs, has-beens, and others out of their league. I was very unhappy with what ran, and realized that minus someone of the calibre of Palin (or Gov. Walker, who was a superstar coming off his recall victory), the party had effectively “written off” the election.
I endorsed Palin and stuck with her until she confirmed she would not run. I then moved to Herman Cain’s camp (as did many Palinites), but his lack of seasoning showed, and he literally had no idea what the media would do to a Conservative Black man (one that enjoys lynching non-White males). After Cain pulled out, I effectively went the same route as the ‘08 primaries, “None of the Above.” Santorum I initially viewed as in over his head (and having lost reelection to the Senate in ‘06, not a very strong candidate). I only swung to endorsing him as a last-ditch attempt to stop the execrable Willard. That Santorum pulled out just as he was gaining momentum confirmed again that he wasn’t ready for prime time (then or now — I don’t support his running AT ALL in 2016).
But a word about Gingrich. Regardless of what he wrote, what he proclaimed, et al, Gingrich was, is, and always will be toxic. He did a great thing in being the leading force to finally bring to an end a 6-decade near-uncontested lock on the U.S. House. But as Speaker, he went from hero to zero in a year. We were on the brink of ending that rapist abomination’s tenure as President, and Newtie allowed Slick Willie to get his mojo back. With the so-called “government shutdown” of 1995, it was all over. That was the last and only year to date when the GOP was in the majority and RAN IT like they were in charge. It doesn’t matter the years of majority control since, they’re just the opposite side of the same statist coin as the Democrats.
Newtie coasted for 3 more years in the House and never turned it around, and was effectively fired by the caucus (for far less than the execrable and incompetent Boehner). He tried for years to remain viable or visible, but I think he simply just went silly. The hand-holding with Nancy Pelosi, the gross ignorance surrounding the Scuzzyflavor (or whatever the hell her name was) special election in NY. The third wife. He just became a caricature of himself (nevermind he was almost 70, which was frankly too old to be running, as was McCain in ‘08 — Reagan being the exception to the rule, though he probably would’ve been at the zenith of his capacities serving as President from 1969-77 or 1977-85. He was not fully up to the task from 1985-89 when he was almost 78 at his retirement).
Often forgotten about Newtie is that he was a Rockefellerite. When he first ran for Congress in 1974 (and 1976), he was to the left of the Democrat incumbent. He moved to the right after that. However, he still often had that strain of making common cause with the left-wing of the GOP caucus. He also had an obsession with wanting the media to like him and thought he could do that in the years after he was deposed. What he could never comprehend is that the media is not the friend of Conservatives, and they never will be. One Republican who understood that was Jesse Helms, and he treated them like the lying scum that they are and never once lost a race because of it.
In the end, Gingrich was never able to repair the damage to his terrible personal approval ratings. Had he been the nominee, the media would’ve took singular glee in ripping him to shreds and dredging up all the old crap from his tenure as Speaker. Despite many FReepers believing to the contrary, he was NOT a viable candidate in 2012. He only had an ounce of credibility and the appearance of leadership solely because of the field of midgets, but there was no way and no how he was going to the White House.
You should not try political analysis at home...you’re gonna hurt yourself.
Newt masterminded the historic 1994 election, without which, we may have never had 2010 or 2014.
Newt tallied more votes in SC and Florida alone than all 7 candidates tallied combined in about 13 of these oddball caucus states and late primaries. Nothing after Florida mattered. It was DONE by then. Newt was about triple Santorum through SC and Florida.
And winning SC is the ONLY WAY Republicans win the White House. No Republican has lost SC in the primary and won the general election. Doesn’t happen.
Who gives a shit what 3000 voters say in the Nevada Primary? Or some primary in April. Don’t mean a hill of beans.
Exactly. Rick Santorum is an outstanding social conservative. But he is a Big Government spender and taxer. As was stated in the 2012 debates ... Look At His Record (yea, ronpaul but on this and other fiscal issues his straight talk is right on)
"He spends too much money. He wasn't leading the charge to slash the budgets and vote against big government."
Rand Paul added that Santorum's vote history proved he wasn't a true conservative.
"He voted to double the size of the Department of Education," Rand Paul said. "He voted to expand Medicare and add free drugs for senior citizens and he has voted for foreign aid. Those are not conservative principles. Seventy-seven percent of the American people are opposed to foreign aid and Rick Santorum has voted for it every time it's come down."
In 2016, we shouldn't be focusing our attention on any of the 2012 candidates. Period.
Put it on Cruz Control.
didn’t huntsman get 20% in NH? that is the vote Pataki is going after. He won’t get it.
Pataki? LOL
17%. I’d guess most of Huntsman’s NH voters will be voting in the rat primary in 2016.
His insulting comments on Ted Cruz say more about Santorum's own limitations than anything about anybody else.
I would personally lump Santorum with Obama, Hillary Clinton, Jeb Bush and John McCain, as individuals that I could never vote for.
William Flax
http://elections.nytimes.com/2012/primaries/states/new-hampshire/exit-polls
Even if half the Indys in NH leave the GOP primary and switch to the DEM (it will be more like 1/3 or 1/4 as those INDYs inclined to the DEMs did not vote heavily in the ‘12 race) ... even still ... there is a substantial Huntsman vote in half the state. Outside of the 2 suburban eastern counties.
The primary electorate in NH has become liberal. 62% described themselves as moderate to liberal on social philosophy. Just Leave me out of it.
2012 NH turnout 248k
2008 NH turnout 235k
no sign of a big “crossover” that will go back to the DEM primary in 2016.
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